Among the collection of notes on our refrigerator door is one of my favorite sayings: Life is the only game in which the object of the game is to learn the rules. It’s a card my wife brought with her when we began our life together. I smile every time I notice these words for they are a signpost keeping me on the true path along my journey of discovering the purpose of my life.

The words came to me again from an unexpected source yesterday – a message from a loved one who is facing a serious health challenge and who has placed herself in the hands of the God for whom she has a deep and abiding faith. She noticed the note some time ago but had said nothing about it until now. And what she said was: “That’s a cute quip, but the truth is we have a rule book that we are suppose to be following.  When we stand to give an answer for our lives God is going to hold us accountable to those rules!” For the first time in all the times I’ve read that note, its resonance with my belief about the nature of alchemy shined through its words.

Alchemy is a personal perspective that sees our world and everything in it as a gift. This view calls forth a natural and compelling desire to explore how the world works. If the rules of nature can be discovered, they can be used to find treasures – wondrous and beneficial things – to heal, to provide the basic necessities for all, to enjoy full and long lives. This is a difficult path because it includes powerful temptations to find or make just what we want for ourselves. The treasures to be found on this path can also lead to unexpected results. A safer path is a more restricted one with a book of rules everyone needs to follow, one created by those who know how to avoid the unexpected.

Now, I’m not proposing that alchemy is the only practice or way of life that people can fulfill themselves in or solve some of the world’s problems. Yet, alchemy is a way of life that demands personal responsibility. The ticket for entrance into the Art is stamped with the message:

Discover the rules to make the world what you can imagine it to be and follow them.

The coniunctio (conjunction) takes place in the new moon, in the underworld…In the deepest depression, in the deepest desolation, the new personality is born.

von Franz, Alchemy: An Introduction to the Symbolism and the Psychology

While Maria-Louise von Franz is not an alchemist, she studied the Art with energy and flare along with Jung and her translation and interpretation of the Aurora Consurgens is intuitively perceptive.

This blog includes links to sites that are making an impact on alchemy in our world at this time. More will follow but the current ones are:

AlchemyLab, created by Dennis Hauck, is one of the most comprehensive sites on the web today offering paths of transformation that flow from his personal knowledge and experiences.

Salamander & Sons is Paul Hardacre’s esoteric book publishing site. Paul and his wife, Marissa, have dedicated their lives to manifesting alchemical truths through the publication of otherwise unavailable texts.

Alkemistinn is the site of Dan Coaten’s organic skin products created in his laboratory in Iceland – land of fire & water, the first elements of alchemy.

Real Alchemy, Robert Bartlett’s site, reveals a working alchemist’s laboratory and includes courses offered by Robert.

Alchemy Web Site, one of the largest sites about alchemy on the web, is the creation of Adam McLean. His list of ancient alchemical texts and images of alchemy is an intriguing database for research or just browsing.

Fourth International Alchemy Conference is the site of the next gathering of alchemists, hermeticists, members of esoteric groups as well as teachers, practitioners, healers, authors and explorers of allied fields from around the globe gathered under one roof.

International Alchemy Guild is an organization whose mission is to bring the ancient practices and discoveries of alchemy into the everyday world. Guild membership is a doorway into knowledge, discussion forums, courses and the largest archive of alchemical material available on the web in one place.

Enjoy!

As a visitor to my blog, I want to personally invite you to participate in an online teleclass I am doing with a dear friend, Michelle Karen, on Nov 15.

The teleclass is an opportunity to participate in a presentation/discussion of a message for our times from two sister esoteric practices – astrology & alchemy. Alchemists developed specific practices to prepare themselves for achieving the goal of their laboratory work – development of their spiritual and psychological characteristics to achieve the Great Work of perfecting themselves and everyday matter. I want to share some of these techniques with you.

As a member of the planning group for the Third International Alchemy Conference held in the LA Conference Center, Oct 23 – 25, 2009, I saw the significance of the message that one of our presenters, Michelle Karen, had for our participants and our time. The synchronicity between her presentation: The Alchemy of Transformation Between Now and 2012 and mine: The Emerald Tablet: A Path of Change & Renewal at the conference was evident and palpable to many participants. Therefore, Michelle and I have agreed to offer a 90-minute follow up session as part of her teleclass series. It is scheduled for Nov 15, 4 – 5:30 pm PST and you can register at Michelle’s site.

Michelle and I hope you will join us for this session that will be both fascinating and useful to anyone who is considering or practicing inner transformation.

Hope to “hear” you there with us.

The alchemical operation consisted essentially in separating the prima materia, the so-called chaos, into the active principle, the soul, and the passive principle, the body, which were then reunited in personified form in the coniunctio or ‘chymical marriage’… the ritual cohabitation of Sol and Luna.

- C.G. Jung Mysterium Coniunctionis

The Ouroboros is one of the earliest symbols in alchemy. The famous Ouroboros drawing contained in the early alchemical text The Chrysopoeia of Cleopatra from the 2nd century in Alexandria encloses the words hen to pan, “One is the All.”

However, the history of this distinct image can be traced back much earlier. In Timaeus, Plato (circa 400 B.C.) described a self-eating, circular being as the first living thing in the universe—an immortal, perfectly constructed animal:

“The living being had no need of eyes when there was nothing remaining outside him to be seen; nor of ears when there was nothing to be heard; and there was no surrounding atmosphere to be breathed; nor would there have been any use of organs by the help of which he might receive his food or get rid of what he had already digested, since there was nothing which went from him or came into him: for there was nothing beside him. Of design he was created thus, his own waste providing his own food, and all that he did or suffered taking place in and by himself. For the Creator conceived that a being which was self-sufficient would be far more excellent than one which lacked anything; and, as he had no need to take anything or defend himself against any one, the Creator did not think it necessary to bestow upon him hands: nor had he any need of feet, nor of the whole apparatus of walking; but the movement suited to his spherical form was assigned to him, being of all the seven that which is most appropriate to mind and intelligence; and he was made to move in the same manner and on the same spot, within his own limits revolving in a circle. All the other six motions were taken away from him, and he was made not to partake of their deviations. And as this circular movement required no feet, the universe was created without legs and without feet.”

The sense of self sufficiency and immortality is in inherent in this image envisaged and described by Plato. He emphasizes that the snake like creature in the form of a circle defines two separate spaces. One is the space that is contained by the snake and encircles and holds all that it is. The other is outside and contains nothingness. Here we have the Ouroboros forming a portal between what is known and what is unknown. In this capacity it holds the cosmos together and perhaps the serpent may even play a role in the creation of the known world from chaos.

We’ll revisit this concept of two very different realms defined by the circular serpent in future posts about the Ouroboros.

Steven Crandell begins his article by this name, which was published on Huffington Post Sep 30, 2010, by telling us: “Good models have good bone structure. Good nonprofits have good board structure.” What’s this have to do with alchemy? As it turns out, the Annenberg Foundation has a program for improving the structure of nonprofits called Alchemy.

As a nonprofit board member, I wondered which alchemy laboratory practices Annenberg uses as part of their program. As it turns out, the Alchemy program focuses on inspiration which is a vital part of any change effort. Their definition of alchemy captures some of the spirit of Art: “Alchemy refers to the practice of turning something ordinary into something extraordinary.” And a logo for the program is intriguing:

But there is nothing in their Alchemy site that speaks about alchemical practices. Is that something to be criticized? I think not. In fact, I know there are laboratory practices that can be converted forms useful to many people working for transformation in organizations. I’ve applied them successfully in the past. And, I am excited that a major Foundation like Annenberg – $1.6 billion in assets – senses that there is something about alchemy that is a key to organizational change.

The questions we need to ask are: Why did this foundation select the concept of alchemy as they understand it to present their program? How many other organizations are doing similar things with “alchemy?” Is this an indication that many people already sense that alchemy has an essential role in our time?

What do you think?

One becomes two, two becomes three, and by means of the third and fourth
achieves unity; thus two are but one….
Invert nature and you will find that what you seek…
Join the male and the female, and you will find what is sought…

- Maria the Jewess, 300 A.D

We are not on the earth, we are of the earth. We are the earth. The gift alchemy has is the revelation that as we change ourselves, we can change the earth and the world in the same way. We can create gold or turn everything into its gold. But we can only do this as we reveal, grow and perfect ourselves. Changing lead into gold is no easier than perfecting ourselves and both are possible. Actually, both are happening now.